MacBook Air M5 Lifts Battery to 14 Hours and Chrome Capacity to 60 Tabs
Updated
Updated · Digital Trends · Aug 8
MacBook Air M5 Lifts Battery to 14 Hours and Chrome Capacity to 60 Tabs
3 articles · Updated · Digital Trends · Aug 8
Summary
$1,099 bought the writer an M5 MacBook Air just before Apple raised the launch price to $1,299, turning the upgrade from an M1 into a notably better day-to-day work machine.
16GB of unified memory and an M5 CPU described as roughly twice as fast let the laptop handle 50 to 60 Chrome tabs smoothly, versus about 15 to 20 on the 8GB M1.
13 to 14 hours of screen-on battery life—up from roughly nine to 10 hours on the M1—changed charging habits enough that the charger can often stay home for a full day out.
MagSafe, two external-monitor support and Thunderbolt 4's 32 Gb/s minimum PCIe bandwidth added practical workflow gains, even though the 13.6-inch display felt only marginally better and the speakers were judged worse.
At $1,299, the M5 Air is framed as harder to recommend than at launch but still a strong portable productivity laptop, especially for users coming from M1, M2 or Intel Macs.